Pedro Leão
@pedroleao.bsky.social
Assistant Professor at Radboud University 🇳🇱 | Brazilian microbiologist 🇧🇷 | Impact of virus-host interactions in Ecology and Evolution 👀
linktr.ee/Pedro_Leao
linktr.ee/Pedro_Leao
Reposted by Pedro Leão
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Thrilled to share our new study! We show that mirusviruses include lineages packed with spliceosomal introns and likely replicating in the nucleus of unicellular eukaryotes—a sharp contrast to most large and giant eukaryotic viruses that replicate in the cytoplasm.
Thrilled to share our new study! We show that mirusviruses include lineages packed with spliceosomal introns and likely replicating in the nucleus of unicellular eukaryotes—a sharp contrast to most large and giant eukaryotic viruses that replicate in the cytoplasm.
Widespread and intron-rich mirusviruses are predicted to reproduce in nuclei of unicellular eukaryotes - Nature Microbiology
Environmental metagenomic explorations show that Mirusviricota lineages lack essential replication and transcription genes and contain spliceosomal introns, suggesting nuclear reproduction.
www.nature.com
November 28, 2025 at 1:21 PM
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Thrilled to share our new study! We show that mirusviruses include lineages packed with spliceosomal introns and likely replicating in the nucleus of unicellular eukaryotes—a sharp contrast to most large and giant eukaryotic viruses that replicate in the cytoplasm.
Thrilled to share our new study! We show that mirusviruses include lineages packed with spliceosomal introns and likely replicating in the nucleus of unicellular eukaryotes—a sharp contrast to most large and giant eukaryotic viruses that replicate in the cytoplasm.
Reposted by Pedro Leão
#Virus discovery has accelerated but linking viruses to hosts is hard. @sullivan-lab.bsky.social use synthetic #microbiomes to optimize & benchmark #Hi-C for virus-host linkage inference, applying this to existing #soil data to reveal 100s of novel linkages @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/3MlAENO
November 25, 2025 at 2:05 PM
#Virus discovery has accelerated but linking viruses to hosts is hard. @sullivan-lab.bsky.social use synthetic #microbiomes to optimize & benchmark #Hi-C for virus-host linkage inference, applying this to existing #soil data to reveal 100s of novel linkages @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/3MlAENO
Reposted by Pedro Leão
🚀New preprint from our lab!
I am very excited to finally share what has been the main focus of my PhD for the past almost 3 years! It is about viral dark matter and a powerful tool we built to shed light on it. 🧬💡
Continue reading (🧵)
I am very excited to finally share what has been the main focus of my PhD for the past almost 3 years! It is about viral dark matter and a powerful tool we built to shed light on it. 🧬💡
Continue reading (🧵)
November 20, 2025 at 6:52 PM
🚀New preprint from our lab!
I am very excited to finally share what has been the main focus of my PhD for the past almost 3 years! It is about viral dark matter and a powerful tool we built to shed light on it. 🧬💡
Continue reading (🧵)
I am very excited to finally share what has been the main focus of my PhD for the past almost 3 years! It is about viral dark matter and a powerful tool we built to shed light on it. 🧬💡
Continue reading (🧵)
Reposted by Pedro Leão
#AsgardArchaea team, led by @archaeal.bsky.social fr @texasscience.bsky.social — sequencing the DNA collected fr mouth of Rio de la Plata to the continental shelf of Uruguay to detect Asgards, a group of single-celled organisms & our closest microbial relatives on the tree of life. bit.ly/3MdniTH
November 21, 2025 at 12:07 AM
#AsgardArchaea team, led by @archaeal.bsky.social fr @texasscience.bsky.social — sequencing the DNA collected fr mouth of Rio de la Plata to the continental shelf of Uruguay to detect Asgards, a group of single-celled organisms & our closest microbial relatives on the tree of life. bit.ly/3MdniTH
Reposted by Pedro Leão
The Drain of Scientific Publishing details very clearly how for-profit publishers making >30% profit margins have corrupted any solution the research community has attempted.
Let's cut ourselves free.
Drain: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Strain: bit.ly/StrainQSS
Oligopoly: bit.ly/OligSciPub
12/12
Let's cut ourselves free.
Drain: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Strain: bit.ly/StrainQSS
Oligopoly: bit.ly/OligSciPub
12/12
The Drain of Scientific Publishing
The domination of scientific publishing in the Global North by major commercial publishers is harmful to science. We need the most powerful members of the research community, funders, governments and ...
arxiv.org
November 11, 2025 at 11:52 AM
The Drain of Scientific Publishing details very clearly how for-profit publishers making >30% profit margins have corrupted any solution the research community has attempted.
Let's cut ourselves free.
Drain: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Strain: bit.ly/StrainQSS
Oligopoly: bit.ly/OligSciPub
12/12
Let's cut ourselves free.
Drain: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Strain: bit.ly/StrainQSS
Oligopoly: bit.ly/OligSciPub
12/12
Reposted by Pedro Leão
Reposted by Pedro Leão
Ocean-M: an integrated global-scale multi-omics database for marine microbial diversity, function and ecological interactions academic.oup.com/nar/advance-... #jcampubs 🌊
Ocean-M: an integrated global-scale multi-omics database for marine microbial diversity, function and ecological interactions
Abstract. Multi-omics analyses have significantly advanced the understanding of complex marine microbial communities and their interactions. Despite notabl
academic.oup.com
November 1, 2025 at 7:35 AM
Ocean-M: an integrated global-scale multi-omics database for marine microbial diversity, function and ecological interactions academic.oup.com/nar/advance-... #jcampubs 🌊
Reposted by Pedro Leão
Congratulations to Philip J. Kranzusch, Ph.D., Professor of Cancer Immunology and Virology, who was one of three scientists awarded top honors at the 2025 Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists.
Watch to learn more about his work: bit.ly/4pZUDkF
Watch to learn more about his work: bit.ly/4pZUDkF
October 8, 2025 at 5:05 PM
Congratulations to Philip J. Kranzusch, Ph.D., Professor of Cancer Immunology and Virology, who was one of three scientists awarded top honors at the 2025 Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists.
Watch to learn more about his work: bit.ly/4pZUDkF
Watch to learn more about his work: bit.ly/4pZUDkF
Reposted by Pedro Leão
Anecdotal, but a lot of highly trained immigrant PhD colleagues and friends have been moving back to their home countries this year.
Every one of those said the reason was safety
Every one of those said the reason was safety
elmo the sesame street character is sitting on a ledge
ALT: elmo the sesame street character is sitting on a ledge
media.tenor.com
September 24, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Anecdotal, but a lot of highly trained immigrant PhD colleagues and friends have been moving back to their home countries this year.
Every one of those said the reason was safety
Every one of those said the reason was safety
"Breakthroughs rarely announce themselves on the good days — they are earned quietly, by refusing to quit on the lousy ones, even when impostor syndrome tells you otherwise."
open.substack.com/pub/leaopel/...
open.substack.com/pub/leaopel/...
September 24, 2025 at 12:20 PM
"Breakthroughs rarely announce themselves on the good days — they are earned quietly, by refusing to quit on the lousy ones, even when impostor syndrome tells you otherwise."
open.substack.com/pub/leaopel/...
open.substack.com/pub/leaopel/...
Reposted by Pedro Leão
Coincidental and exciting! Anaerobic methanotrophic archaea (ANME) do like carbon monoxide - two independent studies showcasing CO metabolism across freshwater and marine ANME (ANME-2d and -2b).
ANME-2d: doi.org/10.1101/2025... (Welte lab)
ANME-2b: reposted (Orphan lab)
ANME-2d: doi.org/10.1101/2025... (Welte lab)
ANME-2b: reposted (Orphan lab)
Carbon monoxide oxidation expands the known metabolic capacity in anaerobic methanotrophic consortia https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.21.677609v1
September 22, 2025 at 9:46 AM
Coincidental and exciting! Anaerobic methanotrophic archaea (ANME) do like carbon monoxide - two independent studies showcasing CO metabolism across freshwater and marine ANME (ANME-2d and -2b).
ANME-2d: doi.org/10.1101/2025... (Welte lab)
ANME-2b: reposted (Orphan lab)
ANME-2d: doi.org/10.1101/2025... (Welte lab)
ANME-2b: reposted (Orphan lab)
Reposted by Pedro Leão
Of the 10 defense systems originally discovered in Doron et al 2018, Kiwa was one of the last to be studied - until now
Kiwa is a membrane-embedded complex activated in phage attachments sites to degrade phage DNA
A nice study by the Nobrega lab
Kiwa is a membrane-embedded complex activated in phage attachments sites to degrade phage DNA
A nice study by the Nobrega lab
Thrilled to see our Kiwa story out today! A membrane-associated supercomplex that senses infection and blocks replication and transcription.
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
Huge congratulations to Yi and Zhiying for bringing it home, to Thomas for starting us off, and to all the collaborators.
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
Huge congratulations to Yi and Zhiying for bringing it home, to Thomas for starting us off, and to all the collaborators.
Kiwa is a membrane-embedded defense supercomplex activated at phage attachment sites
Zhang, Todeschini, and Wu et al. show that the bacterial defense system Kiwa senses
phage attachment at the membrane and assembles a transmembrane complex that halts
infection by blocking phage DNA re...
www.cell.com
July 29, 2025 at 6:53 AM
Of the 10 defense systems originally discovered in Doron et al 2018, Kiwa was one of the last to be studied - until now
Kiwa is a membrane-embedded complex activated in phage attachments sites to degrade phage DNA
A nice study by the Nobrega lab
Kiwa is a membrane-embedded complex activated in phage attachments sites to degrade phage DNA
A nice study by the Nobrega lab
September 21, 2025 at 6:59 PM
September 20, 2025 at 11:34 PM
Reposted by Pedro Leão
We wrote a review on the free nucleotide pool as a central playground in human, bacterial, and plant immunity – now out in Nature Reviews in Immunology
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Was fun to write this piece with Dina Hochhauser!
Here is a thread to explain the premises
1/
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Was fun to write this piece with Dina Hochhauser!
Here is a thread to explain the premises
1/
Manipulation of the nucleotide pool in human, bacterial and plant immunity - Nature Reviews Immunology
Modification of the nucleotide pool is emerging as key to innate immunity in animals, plants and bacteria. This Review explains how immune pathways conserved from bacteria to humans manipulate the nuc...
www.nature.com
July 30, 2025 at 6:05 AM
We wrote a review on the free nucleotide pool as a central playground in human, bacterial, and plant immunity – now out in Nature Reviews in Immunology
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Was fun to write this piece with Dina Hochhauser!
Here is a thread to explain the premises
1/
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Was fun to write this piece with Dina Hochhauser!
Here is a thread to explain the premises
1/
Just a heads-up so people don't get caught off guard. 🔥😎🔥
July 27, 2025 at 9:21 AM
Just a heads-up so people don't get caught off guard. 🔥😎🔥
YES!
15 years later, finally, Science did the right thing at retracted the As life disaster paper! www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Retraction
The Research Article “A bacterium that can grow by using arsenic instead of phosphorus” by F. Wolfe-Simon et al. (1) has been the subject of discussion and critique since its online publication in 201...
www.science.org
July 25, 2025 at 1:00 AM
YES!
Reposted by Pedro Leão
PARIS (AP) — French President Macron announces that France will recognize Palestine as a state.
July 24, 2025 at 8:12 PM
PARIS (AP) — French President Macron announces that France will recognize Palestine as a state.
Reposted by Pedro Leão
French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that France will recognize Palestine as a state, amid snowballing global anger over people starving in Gaza.
French President Macron says France will recognize Palestine as a state
French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that France will recognize Palestine as a state, amid snowballing global anger over people starving in Gaza.
bit.ly
July 24, 2025 at 7:40 PM
French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that France will recognize Palestine as a state, amid snowballing global anger over people starving in Gaza.
With all the memes and the drama over the CEO on the Coldplay cam...
Let me make something crystal clear:
📢 CHARACTER IS A PERSONAL TRAIL, NOT A PROFESSIONAL SKILL
Be aware of people that don't respect their partner...
Let me make something crystal clear:
📢 CHARACTER IS A PERSONAL TRAIL, NOT A PROFESSIONAL SKILL
Be aware of people that don't respect their partner...
July 25, 2025 at 12:41 AM
With all the memes and the drama over the CEO on the Coldplay cam...
Let me make something crystal clear:
📢 CHARACTER IS A PERSONAL TRAIL, NOT A PROFESSIONAL SKILL
Be aware of people that don't respect their partner...
Let me make something crystal clear:
📢 CHARACTER IS A PERSONAL TRAIL, NOT A PROFESSIONAL SKILL
Be aware of people that don't respect their partner...
Reposted by Pedro Leão
Today's reading: Nature should be the model for microbial sciences journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/... by @brettbakker.bsky.social @emilyraehyde.bsky.social and @pedroleao.bsky.social
Looks ideal for a talk I am working on on model organisms ...
Looks ideal for a talk I am working on on model organisms ...
Nature should be the model for microbial sciences | Journal of Bacteriology
Historically, our understanding of microbes has been based on laboratory cultures.
Much of what we know at a mechanistic level is based on “model organisms” which are
species that readily grow in labo...
journals.asm.org
July 12, 2025 at 2:06 PM
Today's reading: Nature should be the model for microbial sciences journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/... by @brettbakker.bsky.social @emilyraehyde.bsky.social and @pedroleao.bsky.social
Looks ideal for a talk I am working on on model organisms ...
Looks ideal for a talk I am working on on model organisms ...
Reposted by Pedro Leão
New online! Viromics approaches for the study of viral diversity and ecology in microbiomes
Viromics approaches for the study of viral diversity and ecology in microbiomes
Nature Reviews Genetics, Published online: 21 July 2025; doi:10.1038/s41576-025-00871-wIn this Review, Roux and Coclet outline current viromics approaches and discuss how they have contributed to our growing understanding of viral genomic diversity, focusing on uncultivated viruses of microorganisms.
www.nature.com
July 21, 2025 at 6:34 PM
New online! Viromics approaches for the study of viral diversity and ecology in microbiomes
"In a competitive academic world, building bridges instead of walls may be our most powerful tool to accelerate discovery and rebuild public trust in science."
I'm very happy with this article piece! 🥳
www.the-scientist.com/science-thri...
I'm very happy with this article piece! 🥳
www.the-scientist.com/science-thri...
Science Thrives on Trust: Why Collaboration Is Our Greatest Strength
In a competitive academic world, building bridges instead of walls may be our most powerful tool to accelerate discovery and rebuild public trust in science.
www.the-scientist.com
June 16, 2025 at 8:24 PM
"In a competitive academic world, building bridges instead of walls may be our most powerful tool to accelerate discovery and rebuild public trust in science."
I'm very happy with this article piece! 🥳
www.the-scientist.com/science-thri...
I'm very happy with this article piece! 🥳
www.the-scientist.com/science-thri...
Reposted by Pedro Leão
OUT NOW:
Structural insights into light harvesting by antenna-containing rhodopsins in marine #Asgard #archaea
@bejalab.bsky.social @labinoue.bsky.social
#microsky 🦠🧪
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Structural insights into light harvesting by antenna-containing rhodopsins in marine #Asgard #archaea
@bejalab.bsky.social @labinoue.bsky.social
#microsky 🦠🧪
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Structural insights into light harvesting by antenna-containing rhodopsins in marine Asgard archaea - Nature Microbiology
Uncultured open-ocean Asgard archaea can harvest light energy using rhodopsins and diverse hydroxylated carotenoid antennas.
www.nature.com
May 29, 2025 at 4:36 PM
OUT NOW:
Structural insights into light harvesting by antenna-containing rhodopsins in marine #Asgard #archaea
@bejalab.bsky.social @labinoue.bsky.social
#microsky 🦠🧪
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Structural insights into light harvesting by antenna-containing rhodopsins in marine #Asgard #archaea
@bejalab.bsky.social @labinoue.bsky.social
#microsky 🦠🧪
www.nature.com/articles/s41...